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Political Regimes as Demographic Regimes: Unpacking the Democracy-
Economic Growth Relationship
Wade T. Roberts
Department of Sociology
The Colorado College
14 East Cache La Poudre Street
Colorado Springs, CO 80903
Phone: 719.227.8220
Email: ## email not listed ##
ABSTRACT
The impact of political regime type on economic growth has attracted considerable
scholarly attention over the years. The results of empirical studies into the matter have
returned inconsistent findings and offered little in the way of mechanisms to account for
any regime-growth effects. I examine the relationship between democracy and economic
growth over the 1980 to 2003 period using cross-national quantitative methods on a
sample of 64 developing countries. In particular, I explore fertility rates as the critical
factor linking regimes and differential growth rates. I then posit and test, against
alternative explanatory factors, family planning program effort as the institutional
mechanism in the regime-fertility-growth relationship. My results show a significant
positive effect of democracy on economic growth over the time period in question, with a
significant mediating role for fertility. Analyses also support the hypothesis that family
planning program effort functions as the primary mechanism in that relationship. I
discuss the implications of my results for the literature and development policy.